Breathe which is written as a letter to her sons. Heres a portion of that program. People here when you say i wonder if why they irredeemable and they hear all white people as individuals as opposed to whiteness as an identity that is clone two. So when i go to the second paragraph and unlike what if we took this identity apart, the people had a different history or body but it would be a different relationship to identity but i think what potentially we have as a consequence is a more humane relationship to each other, when i went later in the first paragraph when i say a person and the individual can be a heaven, certainly it is someone who is raised by a white man or as someone who thinks so many figures like take for example john brown or howard zinn or bob zellmer who i think are some of the most precious people in the world, it is important to not have a formulation that removes them from my sense of struggle that im engaged in, so thats what i was thinking. One more question about breathe before we move on to some of your other books. Mothering black boys in america is a special calling. Yeah, thats a sentence that my mother said to me and i think about it in a number of different ways. One of course is all the risks and people talk about, secondly in some ways that are difficult and maybe not necessarily helpful about the challenges that black boys face in this world whether its mass incarceration or inequality in schooling or cross attendance rates or unemploymen employmentl those things. I think about it differently, i think about all those things are true and i think about simultaneity of wanting to raise my children who are identified as black boys and that in a way that does not do limit their imagination, their sense of possibility that allows them to understand the facts of racial inequality that keeps them from thinking that they are superior to people because theyre relatively privileged visavis black people and also other people generally. And also it keeps them away from seeking patriarchy or dominance in the society that values those things highly so even though those things are more elusive for black men to attain, we have a society that values that and so part of the task is raising them to not value that, but to value their characters and their sensitivity in their complexity and people around respective of what lock walk of light comes from. All the lessons that what it means to become a man are acrosstheboard, often time they are not so good in the lessons of what it is often times not so good unless you counter both of those things with the story that i think is more accurate but much more loving and gives them a greater capacity to be fully human. In the last 19 minutes everything that we talked about are these things that you teach or in part at princeton . Not really which is interesting, and some ways this is a departure, a spirit with which i teach and certainly i teach the work of Toni Morrison and i taught the work of Richard Wright but i tend to teach much more fact driven and material driven as opposed to the emotional register. I do think of teaching as a calling and its important to bring to that a sense of value and humanity and justice of love to the students even though were supposed to be dispassionate. How does one get a phd jd from harvard at the same time. Unwisely. I when i graduated from college i was 21 years old and i was just completely in love with the life of the mind of ideas and i did not want to choose and i wanted to do everything and i said graduate school, law school and then i did two years of graduate school, it was a frenzied pace but it was beautiful, it was amazing, i loved it. I learned so much and every day i was being nurtured the all of the generations of people that came before me and help me understand the world. We went to play a little bit of music and a little bit of bdo, this is from 1999. That is betsy norman singing at the rosa parks congressional golden medal ceremony in 1999. What is that song . That song is lift every voice and sing that was known at the National Anthem and the black National Anthem after the 1970s. It is a song that i described as black americas most precious song. And with that clip of rosa parks as an alabama woman and jesse norman who has departed is incredibly moving. You written a biography of the song may we forever stand as the name of the book. Yes the author and the composer, they were brothers. Who were born in jacksonville, florida renaissance men and of course back in the day they were called race men, people who sought every achievement that they have as being in service, he became the first secretarygeneral of the naacp, the first black men admitted to the bar in florida. Its extraordinary but one of the signature accomplishments of both of their lives was the composition of the song. They were firstgeneration freeman. Born in the 1870s . Their mothers family had been bahamian in their fathers family had been enslaved in virginia. But yes they were of that generation that emerged from slavery with all the hopes and dreams and aspirations that were so quickly dashed with the industry construction. What was the reception in 1900 when the song was written. What was extraordinary is that the song caught on like wildfire. It was almost immediately embraced as black america and a lot of things, i tried to detail this in the book, the United States did not have a National Anthem at this moment even so early on people were referring to it as an anthem was a big deal in the johnson brothers were both educators at the time of the composition and they left florida and moved to new york as songwriters in part because there had been a terrible fire in the city. So they actually were not there in florida as the song caught on and it caught on across the schoolchildren, they reprinted it, began to be rented in the back of hymnals and so it was an anthem of community making, they did not describe as an anthem or intendant as an anthem but they said this is our anthem. If we continued playing the video, we wouldve seen then president clinton. Who knows all three verses. It is one of his distinctions, he may be the only u. S. President who know all three verses of the same thing. From your book, maybe forever stand, hiphop uttered as farewell to the black National Anthem. Where are you going here . One of the things, i talk about this in my first book is that there is something that happens in the 70s and the 80s which is a transformation both of black social and political life that have to do with the Civic Engagement and association on life and its also why the industrialization and theres a piece where i quote the reverend justice on this where he said may you rest in peace, black people are the moral conscience of the nation, hiphop is the refusal of opposition. So its bold, its not formal, its profane and not in unwilling to perform a particular politics and a raveling in the outlaw, which is a commonplace in American Culture but its a different kind of public presence for africanamericans. That departure was significant but what i also talk about in the book. The song keeps coming back so theres been various moments where it seems like it was going to peter out completely. It keeps coming back and even though the kind of institution, the kind of communities in which it was sung on weekly or daily basis dont exist in the same way and black communities. Can you draw a direct line from Langston Hughes to Biggie Smalls . Absolutely. In so many ways, both of them took the beauty of the language and crafted it and made decisions to tell stories that were pointed and often had a political content and resignation deeply and were pleasurable to engage with. And they are different kinds of political subjects, Linkedin Hughes is overtly an activist and organizer. But the relationship to black language both in the u. S. And the desire to understand that as a foundation for the production, absolutely directly connected. Pr oph ats. Part of what i talk about in the book is of course the process by which it became the most popular form of music in the country and had an audience that expanded bill beyond the initial core of audience and wealth that has been produced to hiphop. But theres something that i talked about and something prophetic about it because there was from the beginning and exposition and elucidation of what postindustrial life in urban centers in the United States was like. In all of its complexity. It is not is not an encomium, hiphop is not. Its an exposition and exploration. You use the term mc, muppercaseletter, cuppercaseletter what does that mean. It is the word for a wrapper that is more organic to hiphop, it initially comes from master ceremonies which is a commonplace in other spell it differently, this idea that the relationship between the wrapper and the dj and subsequently the producer was really important. It is absolutely a title. Emcees are rappers, its internal to hiphop describing the role. I was interested in what made in mc good, not just a reflection of a moment in history or a condition in certain communiti communities, what did it consists of, the m seat became really important because those doing a litter ally analysis. From your book, profits of the hood, profits of the hood, the historic construction of blackness in opposition to whiteness in which blackness is demonized has become part of the art forms consciousness. Yeah i should say before going to this, hiphop has changed a great deal since 2004 although i think theres aspects that are still describing the format present in meaningful ways. But there is a very overt play with the imagery of black people as thugs, tupac embraced the idea thug life in the criminal way station of black people in the sense of the very long history of american stereotyping of black people to criminality and access and gangsterism and violence, hiphop has engaged that critically, played into it, it has really sort of played with the social reality throughout. Lets hear from our viewers as we continue to talk about your book, charlie is in Roslyn Heights new york. Hi charlie your book to be. Hi, everybody. I have been citing racism my whole life and ive been very proud of that, ive grown and seen that the world is a very complex and politics is a very complex situation, i dont support black nationalism, thats just as bad as White Nationalism and deceive nationalism in our country, there is good and bad in all groups, black people are just people, theyre not inferior or superior. Black nationalism is just as wrong as White Nationalism. I cannot understand why miss. Is supporting black nationalism. I am not a black nationalist. I am far left and nationalism take some very different faces. There are certainly conservative rams of black nationalism that politically are quite aligned in many ways to political conservatism. If you take an organization like the nation of islam which is why conservative and advocates black nationalism and then theres the version of black nationalism in an organization like the black Panther Party or the court needing committee which are about revolutionary socialism with third world politics, anticolonialism that saw themselves as identified in the life with eyes people across the world historically so i should say that the single term does not but i will say this, i disagree with the caller that their equivalent because certainly people trying to find a way of losing sense of control of comedy over communities that they live in after long history of colonialism and enslavement and domination is not the same as celebrating the history of colonialism. But that is not a designation that i would describe to. You say your far left, what does that mean. I identify as someone who believes in democracy on a socialist because i believe that im against economic exploitation and i believe everybody should have access to safe environments, clean water, schools, a living wage, healthcare, i believe in this extraordinarily wealthy country that we should not have children who are poor, we should not have People Living on the street, i do not think that the narrative and the consequences of economic vulnerability are just the consequences and we should be okay with them. I dont think thats a decent way to organize society. I dont think people are poor because of deficient overwhelmingly, they are poor because they are exploited or have a lack of opportunity. So thats what i believe and so the question, and is much as i write and think about race, it is never separate from the larger question of the distribution of suffering in our society, it is an example of how and eggs society has an opportunity unjustly but i do not want my objective is not for black people to become those who dominate. That is not the idea for me too become free of systems of domination to have a real robust thorough democracy which is only possible if you have a decent quality of life for all people in a society. This is book tv on cspan2 showing highlights from our indepth series. In 2018 book tvs featured bestselling novelist, jodi has sold over 15 million copies of her book and she joins us in november of that year to talk about them. You suggest that Justice Kavanaugh should read your newest book the spark of life, why is that. I think it is probably one of the most balanced books at abortion rights in a womans reproductive rights that i have found, i worked really hard to make it balanced and i think it would allow him to see other peoples points of views with compassion and empathy and protect to wait a little longer. You say all points of views are represented in this book, how is that. The book is actually about ace shooting at a reproductives rights in mississippi, one of the east states a house it left in america because of over 280 laws at the state level has shipped away but reproductive rights since 2012. In my book a gun and comes in with a grudge, starts shooting, he kills patients and hostages in patients and employees and he takes the rest hostage. One of the people that he takes hostage is a 15yearold daughter of the Hostage Negotiator on the outside, the people in the clinic are a wide range of people who have been brought there at this one moment. They believe very Different Things about reproductive rights, you will see individuals who are prochoice and prolife and all of their points of view are very evenly and accurately represented. How do you storyboard a complex story like that with all sorts of connections and things going on. That is a particularly rights question. There is a twist of this book that makes a difference for my others. It is told in reverse, the very first thing that you see is the standoff between the gunman and the Hostage Negotiator. Every chapter goes back in our in time until at the very end of the book what you learn is that brought all the very Diverse People to the clinic at that particular moment. That was much harder than i anticipated it being. I wound up writing a 48 page outline because i had to write it chronologically in reverse and i also had to follow the storyline for ten diverse characters. I never written an outline like that, most of minor three pages long, little sub knobs, i know my characters, another thought, the twist because they want to make sure you leave a paper trail for the reader but in this case there was so much going on and so complex i needed to map it out in the real magic to me was not an outline but the editing. When i edited the book, i took little postit flags that i made my husband go get in a marked uphold book by character and i edited in reverse, ten different times following each characters thread to make sure each story was coherent and then i edited entirely going forward. How much time did you spend in jackson mississippi. I spent a week bouncing between jackson and alabama working in particular with an amazing man named willie parker, he is an africanamerican Abortion Provider who identifies christian and says he performs abortion not in spite of his religion but because of it, and he was a Good Samaritan and he thought he was going to provide for these women if not me. He went back and got trained and now he goes to the United States to the underserved areas performing abortions to women to need it the most. He invited me too come shadow him. Are you taking it with your 25 or 26 bestselling books and you can determine what the title of your book is and what the title looks like. I get cover input and they show me and they say what do you think of it and ill tell them if i like it or dont like it, that was not the original cover for the spark of life. The original one look like small great things and i love the cover of small great things but i did not want people confusing the two. Our amazing art director came back with that and i said that, my eye, i love it. Speaking of small great things, thats the next thing we will talk about. What does that represent. When i look at that cover, i think of those squares, the color chips the artist used and if you look at the cover, there are spots where color is missing. Where there is something not quite right about the color, there is something in absence. Small great things is about racism in america and metaphorically to me, that was such a beautiful illustration of what i was trained to talk about. Okay, are you kennedy . I think anyway person is kennedy. So that book actually looks its based off a reallife incident in flint, michigan, an africanamerican nurse with 25 years of experience in a delivery ward help deliver a baby in the aftermath the babys father said he did not want her or anyone to look like her to touch his kid and pushed up the sleeves to show his swastika tattoo. In the hospital they put a postit note in the babies file say no africanamerican allowed to touch his baby. Of bunch of personnel got together they sued and i hope she got a great payout. But it made me what push the envelope, what if the nurse was only one with the baby went wrong and as a result she was brought up on charges of murder and what if she was defended by a white public defender who like me or many of my friends never considered herself to be a racist. What if i tell a story in her voice, the voice of the white supremacist dad in the white public defender, as they begin to unpack their feelings abou